1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to the field of vending machines and the automatic vending of services, and in particular to the automated vending of mobile cellular telephone services and the rental of portable cellular radiotelephones.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Automated vending of a wide variety of articles has for many decades been well developed and well accepted in the market. The degree of complexity of the vending transaction has generally increased to where certain types of services, such as a restricted range of banking services, are also commonly transacted through automated vending machines.
In addition to the vending of purchased articles, or limited services, the art has devised automated vending machines which rent or lend articles such as rented video tapes. Such a unit is manufactured by Video Vendor, 4234 Main Street, Skokee, Ill. 60076. Such vending units are software driven through microprocessors and include various input and output devices such as a credit card reader and a paper printer. The video customer makes a selection of a video cassette by viewing the title of the cassette through a display window on the front of the unit. He iserts his credit card into the card reader, which reads the card and then makes the necessary credit checks. The microprocessor within the vending unit may comprise a stand-alone unit with its own internal memory, or be communicated through a modem by conventional telephone lines to a central computer office wherein credit checks are facilitated. Upon credit approval, the vending unit then mechanically fetches the selected video tape and dispenses it from the unit. A receipt is then printed and delivered by a microprocessor unit to the paper printer for memorializing the credit card transaction. The receipt is delivered to the customer and the credit card returned.
Later, the customer returns the video cassette to the vending unit which identifies the viedo cassette from a bar code affixed to the video cassette and returns it to its inventory. The appropriate rental charge is then debited to the customer and a final receipt issued. Typically, the rental charge varies depending upon the duration for which the cassette was rented, as well as the day of the week when the cassette was rented.
Although the prior art has devised a flexible system and methodology for renting articles, the transaction which is conducted is simply the lending of the article. No accounting is made in the lending transaction as to what usage is made of the article while it is lent. In the case of a cellular telephone, the charge to which the customer will be obligated, necessarily depends upon the number and type of telephone calls the customer has made while the telephone unit is rented to him. Furthermore, the telephone unit must be maintained and reinitialized for the next customer. This includes, for example, the recharging of the battery and clearing any internal memories within the telephone unit.
Furthermore, the nature of a telephone rental varies dramatically from prior art rental situations, such as with video cassettes, since the telephone unit is highly mobile and may be returned to a vending unit hundreds, if not thousands, of miles away from the unit from which it was originally rented. The ability to handle such trans-national rental transactions and to accommodate the foreign telephone number, which the returned telephone carries, all render the transaction not only more complicated but of a qualitatively different nature.
Therefore, what is needed is an apparatus and methodology whereby the limitations of prior art automated vending machines may be avoided and a vending machine and methodology for mobile cellular telephones provided.